GERMANY AIR LINE

Airports in Germany

Germany's burgeoning airports are being linked into the nation's railway system. Cheap domestic and inter-European flights are an important part of the picture.

An overview of Frankfurt International Airport.

About 120 international scheduled airlines serve Germany, carrying more than 100 million passengers a year. Of these airlines some 100 serve Frankfurt, the nation's biggest airport. The relatively new airport at Munich has become a second hub, and other major airports are located at Düsseldorf, Cologne and Hamburg.

Berlin, presently with a collection of smaller airports, promises to be a major air center in the future. The former U.S. air base at Hahn, 75 miles from Frankfurt, is also playing a role in the aviation picture, as a base for super cheap airlines. These have sent domestic and inter-European fares plunging, even on the established airlines.

There is also a very aggressive program to link air travel to rail travel. High speed InterCity trains directly serve the Frankfurt, Düsseldorf and Cologne-Bonn airports.

Frankfurt is the busiest airport in Germany (www.airportcity-frankfurt.com), with 1340 takeoffs and landings a day, and the third biggest in Europe after London-Heathrow and Paris. It has scheduled connections to nearly 300 airports in more that a hundred countries. And it set a new record for passengers handled in 2005, with more than 52 million. To cope with this traffic the airport has active plans to construct a fourth runway and, on the site of the now abandoned U.S. Rhein-Main Air Base, a third terminal.

Many of the passengers had Frankfurt itself as a destination, since the city is an important commercial center. But Frankfurt is also a transfer point for air and rail connections to other German cities and an air transfer point to many other countries, notably in Eastern Europe and Asia.

Europe's busiest expressway cloverleaf, the "Frankfurter Kreuz" is right adjacent to the airport. This is where the A3 and the A5 autobahns, the most important in Germany, intersect and allow quick access to Europe's extensive superhighway net. The airport also has parking facilities for 15,000 vehicles and its own bus station.

But stress is being laid on reaching the airport swiftly and comfortably by rail. Some 88 long distance trains a day stop at its railway station, affording passengers direct connections to Cologne, Hamburg, Munich, Berlin, Dresden, Nürnberg and many other German cities, not to mention Vienna, Milan, Zürich and Amsterdam. Some airlines even have check-in counters right at the station.

The new high-speed Frankfurt-Cologne rail line, which cuts travel time from two-and-a-half hours to less than an hour, also serves both the Frankfurt and Cologne-Bonn airports. Frankfurt long has had a second railway station, offering rapid transit service to the Rhein-Main area, and this continues to operate.

For all that, Frankfurt is getting stiff competition from the Franz Josef Strauss Airport in Munich (www.munich-airport.com), which is Germany's second air hub.

Munich Airport has been voted Europe's best airport four years in a row in the annual Skytrax passenger survey and ranks seventh among Europe's busiest hubs. In 2007 the airport had yet another record year, with the passenger total reaching 34 million. The airport's growth is largely due to Lufthansa's decision to implement a major expansion program at Munich Airport, which now handles more Lufthansa flights on European routes than Frankfurt.

Munich Airport offers an outstanding range of destinations and is one of Europe's top air transportation hubs based on the total number of weekly connecting flights. With its extensive schedule of flights to and from Italian cities - unrivalled by any other airport outside Italy - Munich Airport has earned the nickname "Italy's most northerly airport." In summer 2008 466 weekly flights served Italian destinations. Connections to central and eastern Europe are also excellent.

Situated right in the heart of Bavaria, Germany's number one holiday destination, Munich Airport is within very easy reach of the Alps, the renowned castles and the many other highlights. And if you are heading for Austria, Switzerland, Italy, the Czech Republic or Slovakia, Munich Airport is just a short trip by car or train to these wonderful destinations.

The third busiest airport is Düsseldorf (www.duesseldorf-international.de), which counted 16.6 million passengers in 2006. It too has a new terminal, replacing and greatly improving upon the one that was destroyed by a disastrous fire in 1996. And Düsseldorf, like Frankfurt, has two railway stations, one for long distance and InterCity trains and one for the local area. A "Skytrain" connects the long distance station to the terminals.

The "cheapy" center at Hahn racked up nearly 3.7 million passengers in 2006, up 20.4 percent over the previous year. The Irish no-frills airline Ryanair has made the so-called "Frankfurt-Hahn" airport its hub, and will fly you from there to Stansted Airport, near London, for as little as $32.

Ryanair offers similar bargain service to 22 European countries. The catch is that, despite that name "Frankfurt-Hahn," the airport actually is 75 miles (125 km) from Frankfurt, and it takes about an hour and 30 minutes to get there.

Nor is Hahn the only center of no-frills flights. The Konrad Adenauer Airport, between Cologne and Bonn, is also becoming one. It is the home base for both Germanwings and Hapag-Lloyd Express. And its new railway station connects it to the Frankfurt Airport in less than an hour on the high speed InterCity line. This opens up many possibilities for connections that should contribute to the airport's growth and also relieve the Frankfurt runways to some extent.

No frills flights also have played a role in preserving Berlin's historic Tempelhof Airport, which was established in 1923 and figured prominently in the 1948-49 Airlift. They've been talking for years about closing it because it is too small and surrounded by built-up areas. But several "cheapies" are glad to have it.

The future of Berlin aviation, however, lies mainly in the planned Flughafen Berlin Brandenburg International (BBI). Since German reunification Berlin traffic has been divided between three airports: Tempelhof; Tegel, which was hastily built during the Airlift, and Schönefeld, the East Berlin airport before unification. Now, however, final plans are being laid to expand Schönefeld and make it into a major airport, with an initial capacity of 20 to 25 million passengers a year. Construction was scheduled to begin in 2006 with operations expected to start in 2011. It is planned to close both Tegel and Tempelhof when BBI opens.

The Fuhlsbüttel Airport in Hamburg also is also becoming very modern. In 2005 it got a state-of-the art terminal, and it is slated, in 2008, to also have an urban railway link-up, a shopping plaza and a hotel.

Lufthansa has cut its fares on domestic and some European flights, partly to meet the competition of the no-frills, but also to better utilize its capacity by luring more people from trains and private cars. Its flights still cost more than the no-frills, but they are also full service. Most domestic trips are an hour or less in duration.

Airlines from the U.S. that serve German airports include American, Continental, Delta, Northwest, United and US Airways.

In the wake of September 11, Germany established flight safety rules similar to the ones in effect in the U.S., including the ban on knives, scissors and the like in hand baggage. Security at Frankfurt and Munich is especially tight on transatlantic flights, on flights to Israel and on flights by British and American airlines no matter where they are headed. It's important that passengers, especially ones on these flights, get to the airport well before takeoff. Some officials urge as much as three hours for international flights.

German airports usually feature duty-free shops, restaurants, bars, car rental agencies, conference centers, banks, post offices and medical facilities. And sometimes they offer much more. The Frankfurt Airport almost doubles as a shopping mall.